Thank you for your responses. I think that Marie Daly is probably fine for right now and I just go a little scared about her new growth. It is firming up and turning green. No extra thorns or odd growth. There a lots of spider mites in my garden right now which would explain the wrinkled leaves. I really don't know about the orange rose. The deep red cane on Ballerina comes from the ground (basal) (I grow own-root roses) but there are 2 canes (lateral) that have more prickles/thorns than other new growth and those 2 canes are growing from nodes that already have canes, so there are 2 canes in each spot, but not three. Connie, I think I understand what you are talking about, but thank-you for your offer of pictures. I have looked at the pictures on rosegeek.com several times. I still am waiting to see what else develops on the roses, so I haven't pulled any of them out yet. Thank you for your help! Ruth

To answer some of her questions: When Ann sees this, or maybe someone else knows, but ..... is there a specific timeline on this disease? We go from a microscopic mite penetrating the rose, to the symptoms we see. Once the mite gets inside the rose, what does it do to destroy it to the extent that the rose takes on these frightening canes? I've seen a healthy roses be planted downwind of a field of RRD sick multiflora and the healthy roses within three weeks started making aberrant growth on some (but not all canes). That was a condition of almost highest conceivable disease pressure...hot temperatures, well watered target plants. A second time was at the opening of a local big box store. Potted up blooming roses were placed in front of the store at the May 1 opening. RRD in multiflora about 0.2 miles away. In early June, those roses that were unsold were moved and I saw them about the second week of June, about 15 of 40 had undeniable RRD symptoms. (The store manager tossed them when I talked to him. I called the state dept of agriculture, told them about it and they checked the producer/grower of the roses and their greenhouses were clean and there was no RRD in multiflora nearby to the green houses.) These two are really fast infection times, but the conditions were right for things to go wrong. This isn't the only disease spread by mites in this Family. Fortunately, most of the diseases are limited to a particular genus. For some of the diseases, they have been identified as viruses spread by the mites. The disease is of aberrant excessive growth and it messes up the plants' ability to convert sugars to starches, it messes up the plants ability to make flowers with reproductive parts. Deer love the fresh growth with most plants are shutting down. When does the mite die? Does it reproduce and infect other roses or do they travel in a colony. The mites are extraordinarily solitary creatures. Females gravid with fertilized eggs can be moved by whisps of wind. There is a low level population of these mites in nature; their population spikes seem to be tied to the freshness of the RRD infected plants. Accession time, the amount of time a mite that's fed on an RRD infected plant then needs to feed on another uninfected rose to transmit the 'virus' is not known for RRD. A similar disease of peaches, spread by a different eriophoid mite, was shown to have an accession time of about 15 minutes.

If not for the ARS, there would be no website of ours about it. When it first got bad here, over a decade ago, I gathered as much info as I could, and it wasn't much beyond "doesn't affect cultivated roses" and we started studying it in twice a month trips to the LMU rose garden where it was a serious infestation. I contacted the ARS, got the info about what it takes for articles for them, did a detailed three part article and had it rejected because it was too long and if I could condense it to 1500 words and two or three pictures, they would reconsider it as it had been a couple of years since they did a piece on RRD. This damn near broke my heart and spirit. I could see the problem growing, the lack of info out there and no way to get the word out. Then via Gardenweb, we got a call from a garden in northern Virginia about RRD in their garden and they needed pictures to confirm it. We (mostly my computer literate husband) turned the three articles into three chapters of what would evolve into our e-book. I also greatly condensed the material from it into an article that appeared in the American Rose. Lots of people who receive the magazine never read it; I can't tell you how many people never saw those three pages. Last January's American Rose also had a bit from me about RRD; that evolved from something I had written for a newsletter within the ARS. I was asked to give a talk about RRD at the ARS National in Philadelphia, and I had a two page hand out summarizing the talk. Those two pages got a fair amount of reprinting with ARS newletters and also led to some talks, some with good attendance, many with marginal attendances. I've given up being frustrated and just try to put what I know out there in a format that can be referenced. If anybody cares to, the bibliography in the e-book is the place they should start, rather than starting from scratch and reinventing the wheel. A decade ago, I said that the problem wouldn't be solved in my lifetime. I've no reason to change that assessment.

Thank you so much for the advice! How did it work out for u having the nursery? And how come u no longer do? If u don't mind my asking. I would love to get this yard covered in roses and eventually propagate n sell some for fun. I don't want it to be so consuming it becomes a chore. I want my own green house so bad!! My neighbors are starting a community farm and they're putting up huge green houses right now so they can grow veggies. It's some kind of program where u pay weekly, monthly or yearly and get a variety of fresh picked organic veggies n eggs or meat but they're not doing the eggs n meat. What's crazy is neither of them know anything ab growing food or plants so they're working with a company to teach them the ropes. I'm so jealous of all that green house they have now ! ..it's huge!! But empty, I sure could see my roses in there :) thank you so much for the info! I only have 3 acres but I'm turning it into a small ranch ( I have some farm animals) with huge rose gardens & I will eventually post s thread for help for a nice catchy name for this ranch. Any ideas? I do have 4 boys and I want a name that has rose in it but I'm not sure yet what to name it. Well get a new gate with a nice sign above with the name eventually . I'm super excited!!